Effect of Gd and Nd Additions on the Thermo-Mechanical Response of a MgMn Alloy

Abstract

Alloying Mg with Mn improves the strength and corrosion resistance. The addition of rare-earth elements weakens the texture and improves the age hardening response. Nd and Gd are ideal elements to investigate the effect of low and high solid soluble rare-earth elements in Mg on the thermo-mechanical behavior of MgMn alloy. For this purpose, a Mg alloy with 1 wt% Mn and 1 wt% Nd was produced and then modified with the addition of 1 wt% Gd. In situ high-energy synchrotron X-ray diffraction was performed during compression to analyse the deformation behavior of the material. The compression experiments have been performed at room temperature and 350 °C up to a deformation of 0.3 with a deformation rate of 10−3 s−1. The compressed samples were subsequently subjected to electron-backscattered diffraction to investigate the post-mortem microstructure.